BIRDS OF NEW MEXICO 
664 
. s ' he middle. The bill characters correlated with nine primaries 
• •da scaled tarsus are distinctive of the North American representatives 
r the family. Rictal bristles are well developed, the wings are long 
and pointed, and the tail moderate and emarginate. As the Tanagers 
are fruit and insect eaters, they are migratory in the United States. 
They inhabit woodland, nest in trees, and are no great songsters 
(Coues). 
LOUISIANA OR WESTERN TANAGER: Piranga iudovici&na (Wilson) 
Plate 71 
Description. — Male: Length (skins) 6.2-0.9 inches, wing 3.7-3.S, tail 2.6-3, 
bill .6, tarsus .7-.8. Female: Length (skins) 6.3-6.9 inches, wing 3.5-3.8, tail 
2.7-2.8, bill .6, tarsus .7-.8. Adult male in summer: Foreparts of head and neck 
red (varying from orange-yellow to crimson on head and usually paler on throat), 
hind-neck, posterior upperparts and underparts light yellow; hack , wings, and tail , 
black; wing coverts with broad yellow patches and narrow yellow or whitish bar , terfcials 
(and sometimes tail feathers) tipped with white; under wing coverts yellow; iris 
brown. iSB - a 1 b Legs od foot > > sU gray. Adult nok in win 
Similar to summer male but head yellow (or but slightly tinged with red), color 
obscured on back of head and hind-neck with olive-green or dusky feather tips; 
o;.. k mT v with yellowish feather margins; wings ami tail with white or yellow' 
' •: F m bead sometime* tinged with red; upperparts 
nb. tTr : , >-• .pub r>. ustniUv giavish, rump and upper tail coverts yellow¬ 
ish; wings and tail grayish brown with olive-green edgings, wings with two distinct 
yellowish or one yellow and one while band; underparts mainly dull yellowish , under 
tail coverts light yellow. Young in juvenal plumage: Dusky yellowish or brownish 
green, yellower below and obscurely streaked; w'ings and tail brown with two yellow¬ 
ish bars. 
Comparisons. —The tw'o yellowish-—or one yellow' and one w'hite—wing bars are 
diagnostic of the Western Tanager in any plumage. 
Range.—B reeds in Canadian and Transition Zone* fn.m .•-trr’r. Alaska, 
southwestern Mackenzie, and southwestern South Dakota fouth to nigh mountains 
of central-western TYxa.s, southern New Mexico, southern Arizona, and Lower 
California (found in spring :;:ul summer); winters at Brownsville, Texas (rarely), 
and south from central Mexico through highlands to Guatemala; casual in migra 
tion in Wisconsin, New York, New England, and Louisiana. 
State Records.—T he mountains of both northern and southern New Mexico 
are inhabited during the summer by the Western Tanager. In the north, in the 
Sangre de Cristo Mountains, a specimen w'as taken, July 5, 1903, at Canoncita, 7,000 
feet, and a pair was seen about July 7, at Glorieta, 7,500 feet (Bailey); on July 16, 
1903, parents were still feeding young at 8,000 feet on the Pecos near Willis; the 
species was also seen July 19, at 8,700 feet, and a single bird on July 25, at 10,200 
feet, in the Upper Pecos mountains. It breeds in the Hondo region near Twining, 
where, at about 10,000 feet, on August 4,1904, a bob-tailed young w T as found with its 
parents (Bailey), lit is fairly common and well distributed over the Sangre de 
Cristo Range as high as 10,000 feet. On June 22, 1919, a pair was noted on the 
Little Rio Grande at about 7,400 feet, evidently near the nest; on June 24, several 
were seen 20 miles southeast of Taos at 10,000 feet. It was heard singing commonly 
about Cowdes, July 10-18, from 8,000 to 10,000 feet (Ligon). In the Santa Fe region 
it is common in the mountains from 7,500 to 10,000 feet (Jensen).] In the western 
